


Too Dark to Read

by withthebreezesblown



Series: The Tempest Inside [4]
Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age: Origins
Genre: F/M, Puppies, alistair learns to be by himself, but i'm incapable of not being morose at some point, honestly this was meant to be entirely fluff and puppies, or maybe he learns that he isn't alone, previous alistair/f!warden referenced, so many puppies - Freeform, still it's pretty fluffy?
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-10
Updated: 2017-05-10
Packaged: 2018-10-30 10:41:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,988
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10875075
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/withthebreezesblown/pseuds/withthebreezesblown
Summary: An unhardened King Alistair looses everything that matters when he takes the throne of Ferelden. This is a story about everything hefinds: his courage, and his determination, and a reason to make a real effort at ruling, and the ability to let go of the things he can't get back.While this technically belongs in myThe Tempest Inside series, it can be read alone without missing anything too critical I think.Also, I cannot recommend enough the fic that TrulyCertain did for a remix fest,keep your heart close to the ground. It's a sort of companion piece to this.





	Too Dark to Read

Despite all Eamon’s warnings, despite the righteous anger Alistair has already endured from the man and the verbal thrashing (well, let’s be honest, thrashing _s_ ) he will surely endure when the Chancellor returns, the Satinalia feast that he was told was suicide turns out to be the least unpleasant thing he thinks that he has had to endure since the weight of that damned crown settled on his head.

All along the row of mismatched tables dragged from nearby houses out into the cold under the leafless vhenadahl, people are _smiling_ at him. And not those blasted, Blighted, flaming, fucking simpering leers that would have been directed at him by the mass of arls, arlessas, and banns if this feast had been held in the customary way, with the customary company.

Sure, there are a few open glares, and there are plenty of appraising eyes still tinged with suspicion, but there are also happy mothers feeding the children in their laps and whispering in their ears as they point toward him at the end of the table, glancing at him with eyes full of an appreciation that hits him far harder than all of the not inconsiderable venom directed at him combined.

When the food dwindles, five elves bring instruments and begin playing music that isn’t quite like anything he thinks he’s ever heard before. The redheaded elf who had sat on his right hand side during the meal, conversing as freely with him as with the elves on her other side, the one who still treats him much the same as she treated him when he was just a Warden rumored to be a King’s bastard during the Blight (well, the same as she treated him once she had determined the Grey Wardens weren’t exactly the kind of shem she was used to), sidles up to him with a decidedly wayward grin. “So, do you think you’ve given the proper gentlefolk of Ferelden enough fodder for one lifetime, or would you like to dig your hole a little deeper?” she asks, holding a hand out to him.

The slight smile that has been on his face for a while now fades as he gives her a look of earnest regret. “Unfortunately that will require you to make a choice of rather dire importance. _Either_ we can jab at the hornet’s nest, unwise and satisfying as it will surely be, _or_ you can keep your toes in tact and functional. It wouldn’t be right not to give you fair warning.”

He can’t help the laugh of relief when she rolls her eyes and pulls him toward the growing crowd of dancers. The irony does not escape him that here, among only servants, guards, and elves, is the first time he’s felt human in _months_.

* * *

The verbal thrashings he expects don’t come. He isn’t even aware that Eamon has returned to the Palace until a servant informs him that the Chancellor has already taken his dinner in his rooms and will not be joining the King.

For days the only conversations between them are the ones that can’t be avoided, and the cold, clipped nature of them makes Eamon’s point as clearly his silence. He isn’t sure he truly realized the extent to which, most days, Eamon is the only person who speaks to him without the entire exchange being framed as master to servant, king to subject. He is the only one who reacts to Alistair’s quips and sarcasm, and while his displeasure doesn’t exactly give the satisfaction that _appreciation_ does, there’s a gratification in it, far more so than in the stoic silence of the servants, who seem to view his humor as some sort of test in which any reaction at all is failure, or in the forced chuckles of the nobles before they quickly change the subject without comment.

Eamon even forgoes their nightly chess match, started because he thought his King ought to get some practice strategizing. That first time, he’d even offered a wager to tempt Alistair–the King’s presence at the following day’s session of court: if Eamon won, he would attend as usual. If Alistair won, Eamon would judge in his place. Alistair had allowed the man to explain all the rules in detail, had questioned how every piece should move, had deliberated during each turn before taking it with a blithe uncertainty. And when, to Eamon’s stunned disbelief, he’d won, he’d raised his brows high. “No! Did I really? Beginner’s luck, I suppose. Well, do enjoy your day in court.”

The look of disbelief on Eamon’s face cleared with comprehension, and when he swallowed the last of his whiskey and set the glass back down, the expression left behind was either vaguely amused irritation or irritated amusement. In it there had been a touch of pride. “You little shit; you didn’t mention they’d taught you chess in the Chantry.”

Without the chess, without anyone who ever speaks to _Alistair_ and not just _the King_ , he feels like he’s disappearing. He feels more invisible than he felt in the dark and silent cell they locked him in for screaming in the Chantry’s halls. If he could find someone to enchant his clothes to walk around without him, he wonders if anyone would even notice he wasn’t inside.

After two weeks of this, a note comes from Teagan, requesting his presence in Redcliffe. He’s riding out of Denerim less than an hour after its receipt, well before the note he’s left for Eamon is delivered.

_There’s a kitchen boy with hair tolerably like mine. I’ve left my usual outfit laid out. Give the boy a wash, and tell him not to speak. If he just smiles like a bit of an idiot and nods, I’m sure no one will notice he isn’t me._

* * *

“Alistair!”

When his sort-of uncle claps his arms around him in an embrace full of sincere enthusiasm, there’s a moment where he wants to cry. Being back _here_ , in _this_ stable, reminds him how as a child he’d thought there could surely be no fate lonelier  than being a bastard, disdained by the gentle-born, avoided or mocked by everyone else.  He couldn’t have guessed then how much more isolating it would be if the only people who dared to look at him at all saw nothing but the title and trappings and power of a King.

Beside them, a horse twitches its tail and drops a pile of excrement, and Maker is he grateful for it. Instead of dropping his head on Teagan’s shoulder and crying, he snorts as he steps away. “Ah, the fresh, sweet smell of my childhood home!”

Though Teagan is one of the only people he can rely on to be entertained by his always irreverent–and these days, more often than not, rather bitter–humor, the man’s smile is marred by a wince, and it’s only after that Alistair thinks perhaps it was a sensitive topic to joke about, given what the man had told him shortly after his coronation: “I should not have let my brother send you–either to the stables or the Chantry. He kept Maric’s secret well. I thought you were his. I thought it not my place.”

The arl shakes it off quickly, gesturing welcomingly toward the castle. “You arrived before I’d even expected Eamon to have let you make your evasion.”

“Ah. Well…” Rubbing at the back of his neck, an unpenitent yet vaguely guilty grin is all the explanation he offers, and it says enough.

Teagan’s smile is bemused. “He’ll blame me, you know. Not to say he _won’t_ still blame you. But he’ll blame me too.”

Inside, he directs their steps toward the upper floor where the bed chambers are. “I have a bit of a dilemma, you see, that I was rather hoping you might be able to help me out with.”

When they pause outside the largest chamber, the one that had been Eamon’s, Alistair can’t help a cheeky smirk. “You know, fond of you though I am, I’m _not sure_ I’m the person to help you out with a _bedroom_ dilemma…”

Teagan just chuckles quietly before dropping his hand to the doorknob. “It sounds like they’re sleeping, but you’d likely still do well to brace yourself.”

The door has hardly moved a fraction of an inch before the first squeaky, high pitched bark rings out, and before it dies, there is a cacophony of yips, barks, growls, and scrabbling feet and claws against the stone floor. As soon as the door is out of the way, it’s like being rushed by a knee-high tempest. The writhing, wriggling brown bodies are so crushed together in their enthusiastic attempt to shove each other out of the way and get to the two men in the door that it takes a moment for Alistair to determine just how many mabari puppies make up the mob. Seven. Or possibly eight; there may be one underneath that one. Then again, that one there may have just swallowed the one beside it whole, so it could be seven.

Teagan sighs. “The servants have threatened to quit if I don’t either get rid of them or move them out to the stables.” The mother steps lazily over the little hoard to rub herself against Teagan’s side, and he squats down, scratching her ears and pulling her face close to his.

Alistair can’t help an amused acknowledgement of the fact that any Orlesian would be horrified that not only does this man, one of the most powerful in the country, let his dog sleep in his bed, he keeps her puppies in his room. It’s so very _Fereldan_ , he can’t help finding it strangely touching. If he _must_ be King, there are certainly worse peoples to be King of.

“But they’re _Neve’s_ puppies. I can’t put _Neve’s_ puppies in the stable.” He glances up at Alistair, then, and there it is again, that hint of guilt, before he continues. “So I am left either finding suitable homes for them or finding new servants. And I’ve been politely informed that if they all quit because of the dogs, I’m going to be blacklisted, and I’ll end up having to deal with all the chewed up rugs and broken porcelain myself. So I’ve had to come up with a list of those I would trust with my Neve’s pups. You are at the top, so I thought I’d give you first pick.”

Alistair can’t keep the surprise from his face. It’s not that he’s never been trusted–well, if he hadn’t been trusted _entirely too damn much_ to do things he _isn’t even capable of_ , then he’d never have ended up King to begin with, but _she_ was raised in the Circle, and who could blame her for being half mad and, at least on the subject of himself, wholly foolish? Even now, even as King, no one but her has ever given _trust_ to him so freely, and it catches him off guard. All he can manage is, “You want me to take one of these monsters?” but he’s sure Teagan must hear the thing he can’t keep out of his voice. It’s something like wonder.

If he hadn’t been squatting to get a better look at the puppies, all of them excited to the point of quivering like sausages in a frying pan, he would not have caught the words Teagan murmurs so quietly against the grown mabari’s ear, but he is, and he does. “He is a good and kind and _lonely_ man. You tell them that.”

If he wasn’t positive before, he is certain then. He isn’t the one doing Teagan a favor. This is Teagan looking out for _him_ , as he has so often tried to do since Alistair found himself being thrust down onto a throne he’d never wanted.

He ends up sitting on the floor with puppies crawling all over him, and for a while they are just soft, warm, and indistinguishable, until they begin to make their personalities known. There’s one that keeps biting the puppies beside her whenever they get between her and Alistair’s petting fingers, and occasionally biting his fingers if he seems to occupied with the puppy his other hand is petting. There’s one that, despite the nips from his sister, rather insistently keeps stepping on her head with his oversized paws in an attempt to get his turn with Alistair, though he tends to topple over as soon as his head is stroked. And there’s one that’s gone to sleep, despite the furious commotion all around it, with it’s head on his thigh, positioned just so that the patch of drool trickling slowly from its mouth is going to leave a spot that looks like he’s peed himself when he stands.

Eventually Teagan beckons him, and he rises, moving the sleeping puppy gently so as not to wake him, uncertain what he’s expected to do and a little reluctant to leave off being licked and cuddled against, which he was enjoying more than he should admit. “I’m… not sure how this works? Do you… do you think one of them imprinted?”

He just smiles and waves Alistair through the door. “Come on and we’ll see.”  
The moment he takes a step, the nippy one latches onto his pants and plants her feet. One day, this will be an effective method of stopping a grown man. For now, Alistair just chuckles as he carefully tugs, dragging the puppy across the floor rather than freeing himself.

“Well, then, it would appear–” Before Teagan can finish his sentence, one of the puppies launches itself toward the one attached to his pants, goes tumbling past both her and Alistair, and then scrambles to correct the overshoot, finally closing his jaw on Alistair’s other pant leg with a stubborn whimper.

Teagan’s expression is genuinely pleased. “It looks like you’ll be taking _two_ puppies back to Denerim with you.”

He’s surprised by just how relieved he is as he bends to scoop them both up, one in each arm ( _Maker_ , he won’t be able to do this for long; they are already _heavy_ ). He supposes there is a part of him that will _always_ be the boy who, before Duncan, was never chosen for anything. He can’t help grinning at Teagan. “Well, on the bright side, I’ve weeded out the defective ones for you. There’s obviously something wrong with them if they’ve imprinted on me.”

Teagan just shakes his head seriously. “Oh, no. That one there, she’s the brains of the litter, clever even _for_ a mabari. Bossy, too. You’ll have your hands full with that one.”

They’re halfway down the hall when there’s a shriek from Teagan’s bedroom and frantic scratching at the door accompanied by increasingly distraught yips.

Teagan’s expression is amused. “Perhaps not _two_.”

He heads back down the hall and hardly has the door cracked when one of the puppies comes bounding out of it, making a beeline for Alistair and jumping up to put his front paws on his knee as he whimpers accusingly. He’s certain it’s the one that was sleeping on him.

It’s a struggle to get all three in his arms at once, but he’s determined if only on principle. After all, he’s already hurt the sleepy one’s feelings by nearly leaving him behind. The least he can do is carry them all downstairs despite the fact that they are entirely capable of doing it themselves. 

* * *

He takes a carriage back to the Palace. Not that the puppies could keep up with his horse anyway, but what kind of a Fereldan would make mabari puppies _walk_ ? Maker knows he’s a terrible King, but _that_ could get him stoned to death! And perhaps there is a small part of him that is determined that _this_ , caring for these puppies, will be the one responsibility he doesn’t run from or buckle beneath or make a show of competence at while he’s really just drowning in it.

When one of the males nearly falls out of the window while craning his head out and then has a ridiculous trouble getting his enormous paws beneath him and upright that leaves Alistair laughing, he knows what to name him. The puppy who stumbles like a drunk is named for the only man he’s known incapable of being drunk into a stupor, and maybe it’s a little in honor of _all_ the Warden brothers he lost so long ago that day at Ostagar when Alistair calls him Grigor.

The female is… nippy. She nips if he doesn’t pet her when she seems to think he should be. She nips if he pays too much attention to the other puppies. She gets him nearly hard enough to draw blood once, but when she immediately climbs into his lap and alternates between licking the bitten finger and his face, he can’t work up any particular anger about it. When she gives him a jealous nip again later as he strokes the sleeping puppy’s ears, he rolls his eyes at her. “You’re as bad as the Arlessas at those blasted balls Eamon keeps throwing!” She just tips her head haughtily, and somehow it’s settled. Arlessa it is.

It’s only when the arrive in Denerim and the sleepy one finally wakes, shaking his head eagerly that Alistair knows what to call him. After all, he always slept through Matins too.

* * *

Eamon’s irritation at Alistair’s leaving without consulting with him (and by “consulting with,” he clearly means “asking for permission from”) is all that he expects, but the man’s displeasure over the puppies is decidedly less. He simply raises a weary hand to his brow, thumb rubbing there exhaustedly. “I suppose there are worse things you could have returned with. Perhaps it will please the people to see you embrace the term, ‘Dog Lord.’ Though, Maker have mercy, could you not have waited until they were older?”

Worse “things.” Alistair has a strong suspicion that he means some _one_ more than some _thing_ , and there’s a swell of resentment, as though the man himself and his disapproval even amongst the reasons _she_ isn’t here with him. It is no comfort that she has made her choice, and unlike _himself_ , Eamon’s opinions have never been more than a passing consideration to her.

He tries to rein in his bitterness. He has more success than he expects, helped along, no doubt, when he glances at the puppies as Arlessa pounces Grigor and Matins jumps on top with a yip. He isn’t thinking at all of the fact that Teagan claimed to need the puppies gone as soon as possible when he answers simply, a grin spreading over his face, “No. I couldn’t have.”

* * *

 On the puppies’ second day in the Palace, when he comes to his chambers where, at Eamon’s insistence, he’d left the puppies, he discovers that Arlessa has left him a gift in his bed to demonstrate her umbrage at being left behind. An image of the the jealous, viperous women after which she has been named flashes through his mind, all of them just waiting for him to pass close enough for them to strike, sharp claws digging into his arm as they attach themselves. He can’t help feeling that her pooping in his bed is meant as statement on her namesake as a signal for him of her displeasure, and he finds himself laughing even as he groans in disgust.

The pooping in his bed motivates him, for once, to disregard Eamon’s direct instructions. He’s already decided when he lays his head on his freshly laundered pillow that night. From now on, he _will_ be bringing his puppies to all of the Councils of Important Thingies or Assemblies of Essential Whatnots. If Eamon dislikes it, they can try locking the puppies in _his_ room while Alistair is occupied.

It goes surprisingly well. Aside from Arlessa barking with unexpected menace for something not half grown at a Bann who’d raised his voice, the puppies are quieter even than he hoped for, neither whining nor pouncing on each other, though days later Eamon points out the tooth marks on the table’s legs with irritation.

The tooth marks end up being the _least_ of Eamon’s concerns. He’s seated next to the Orlesian Ambassador, who’s whining about something or other in his awful, nasally voice when there’s a loud snap and the entire table tilts, collapsing in the laps of Eamon and the Ambassador, seated closest to the leg that has given way. The Ambassador’s shriek alone is, in Alistair’s opinion, surely worth any irritation the incident generates. Eamon, sadly, does not share his opinion.  And perhaps Alistair hadn’t _exactly_ helped the situation by being overcome by a coughing attack at the moment, but the accusation that he’d been _laughing_ is entirely outrageous. How terribly unkingly and undignified and… well maybe a _few_ of the coughs had been covert giggles.

Though he was ready to face Eamon’s irritation, he is not quite prepared to face the man’s fury, and so after “the table incident,” the puppies do indeed end up locked in Alistair’s room during important meetings. After weeks of this, he tries convincing Eamon that it’s actually quite bad for his image to be seen without a single mabari. The man only says, “Perhaps when they’re older,” though Alistair can’t help thinking what his expression says is, “if I haven’t stuffed them in a sack with rocks tied to it and drown them by then.”

* * *

 A Bann whose name he can’t recall is droning on and on about having his taxes lowered ( _Maker, fine, yes_ , _lower the man’s damned taxes_ ; if Eamon claims they can’t afford to, he can think of a dozen frivolities off hand he will happily forego to end this prattling on and on), while Alistair’s mind drifts. He’s certain Arlessa is pooping in his bed. Right now, while this pasty man who has obviously never worked his own fields a day in his life natters on, she’s making a point about how she does not appreciate being locked in his rooms and left behind. As though it’s his fault! Probably she will poop right on his pillow, to be certain her point is made. Temperamental, demanding creature.  He can’t help wondering if she doesn’t go out of her way to exemplify the traits for which he named her as a sort of revenge.

The man pauses, and he sees his chance--if he interrupts now, he can tell the man his taxes will be lowered by half the amount he’s asking, and, Maker have mercy, today’s Very Important Meetings will be done. It will not please Eamon, though. He hesitates too long, and sinks further into his seat when the man continues.

* * *

 How pleased they are to see him nearly makes having to leave his dogs behind worth it. Once Arlessa has been cooed over to her heart’s content (it is, after all, critical that she be told _whatagoodgirl_ she is for not pooping in his bed as expected), and Matins’ head is flopped in his lap so that his unclipped ears hang back like wings as he snores softly, Alistair goes through his letters.

There is one addressed to him (well, to _His Majesty_ ) in Solona’s hand. He opens it first, with no hurry. It will be much like every other one he has received from her for months now. A dry, clinical report of the highlights of the week for the Wardens of Amaranthine, and an update on the sister he had rescued from the Gallows and sent to her. Even there, little of the woman behind the title Warden Commander shines through. If he knew her less well, he would not catch the pride and affection at all. _Her magic continues to improve in both power and precision._ He sets it aside, where Grigor will not be able to step on it.

He’s flipping through the rest, tempted to toss them into the fire unopened, when one catches him. The obligatory _His Majesty_ is there, but it’s followed by _Alistair Therin_ , and he can’t think of anyone who bothers to include his name. He opens it curiously, and when he understands who has sent it, something catches in his chest.

_Dear Alistair,_

_I hope it’s okay that I called you Alistair. You did say I should. I am writing because I found one of Solona’s letters to you, and, well, it was open and on her desk, and I wasn’t being nosy, but I may have accidentally read it, and the point is, it was terrible. She sounded like a darkspawn had crawled up her butt and died there. It is a very bad representation of my sister. She is lots of fun. This winter she took me ice skating, and we made giant ice griffons together in the Vigil’s yard which are still there because winter in Ferelden is very, very cold! I am trying to convince Solona to have a Wintersend party to celebrate all of the Heroes of the Fifth Blight. We could invite you and Leliana and Zevran and Wynne and Shale and I don’t think he would come, but we could invite Sten too. (Since we do not know where Morrigan is, you don’t have to worry about her coming.) You could all see our griffons!_

_I just thought you should know that Solona may have changed since the Blight (she says she has), but she doesn’t ever look or act like a genlock is stuffed up her bum. Mostly, she looks like this (please refer to included drawing)._

_Yours truly,_

_Phoebe Amell_

_Sister of the Hero of Ferelden, Warden Commander Solona Amell, Savior of Ferelden (and Thedas)_

_Honorary Grey Warden of Vigil’s Keep_

At first, it hurts to look at the drawing. Solona had mentioned it once, that Phoebe had an uncanny ability to capture not just the look of a thing, but the feel of it, and, _Maker, she has_. He knows that smile exactly, remembers it better than he remembers what smiling back at it felt like.

She’s _happy_.

The realization surprises him, and for an instant he feels something like jealousy, and though he doesn’t know if it’s over her happiness or that she is happy without him, he stamps it down immediately. She deserves her happiness. She deserves every instant of it.

After a moment he realizes he’s holding his breath and forces the air in, slow and deep, as he makes himself look at the drawing again.

She’s happy. She faces darkspawn almost daily; when she isn’t dealing with that, she’s dealing with politics; three of her four siblings are still held in Circles, but she has found a way to be happy.

Every time he’s allowed himself to think of her, it’s been covetous, a desperate wish for how things _should_ have been, for both of them. He’s never considered that this is exactly what her life _should_ have been, that him not being there with her changes so little for her when it would change everything for him.

And even as he has to struggle to keep from clutching the paper til it wrinkles, a thought that’s never occurred does, though he isn’t stupid, and he knows it’s the very opposite of what the letter was meant to inspire.

He could let her go like this.

The thing that he’s been aching for, it’s been the idea of her aching for him.

But she isn’t. She doesn’t.

And he is, truly, glad for her happiness. If she is happy, he can unclench the fist he has made of his heart. He can let her go.

Still, he will always wish the best for her. It can’t hurt to write back to her sister. Though he’ll have to send the letter with one of his guards and have it delivered directly to the girl when Solona isn’t looking. Happy or no, he is quite certain that him writing to her sister will not please her.

* * *

 Even without the letters themselves, the drawings Phoebe sends tell him more about Solona than the woman herself has told him in the months of letters that she has so obviously sends out of some sense of obligation since her sister arrived at the Vigil. She sends a drawing of the keep itself, rain falling from a grey sky, and though the figure on the roof with her legs hanging over is too tiny to make out details, without any logical explanation, he knows it’s Solona. She sends one of herself and Solona ice skating, hands joined, both grinning the same wide grin with the words “Solie and Pheebs” written across the top, making him suspect that this one was originally intended for Solona herself, not him. He wonders what changed her mind.

In the summer she sends him one of Solona at the beach, hair wet as loose strands curl in the salt and wind. If it causes an ache to look at it, he can at least honestly say it is not _pain_.

Not that he’s thinking about the drawing he received yesterday as he walks between bodies at the latest in the series of balls Eamon insists they host, as though Alistair is unaware that the man is still, after all this time, determined that he will find his King a wife. Well, maybe he is thinking about the way Solona’s hair would curl into ringlets after they’d been caught in the rain, and how none of the coiffed, curled styles here have a thing on the beauty of it.

And that’s always been the problem, hasn’t it? He’d tried at least once or twice; he truly had. At the very least, he’d _tried_ to try. He’d never expected to find a woman who could burn as brightly as Solona, but he’d told himself that if he could just find one woman who could hold a candle to it…

Some of them are pretty enough, he supposes, these Arlessas and their daughters. Nothing like--well, pretty enough. And if pretty had been all that mattered, it might have _been_ enough. But then they always open their mouths. Maker help him.

It is inevitable when he finds a woman clutching at his arm, nails digging in.  Her hair is golden and her eyes are green, and maybe she’s even beautiful, but _Maker_ , her laugh is a horrible noise, high pitched and grating in a way that travels down his spine, and there’s something a little too careful in how she laughs at every conceivably amusing thing to come out of his mouth.

“...I nearly chose the purple silk. I do think the green was the better choice though, don’t you?” She looks up at him, batting her lashes delicately. He nearly groans out loud. _Really?_ After all, he isn’t blind. He’s seen that the dress brings out the color of her eyes. He takes to one of his favorite games--trying to imagine the situation reversed, himself power hungry and trying to impress his partner. He’s never thought himself particularly charming and Maker knows he has little gift with words, but surely he could do better than this. Perhaps it’s harder than it seems. She’s certainly making it look painfully difficult enough.

Arlessa saves him from having to respond, pressing her nose between their bodies until she’s wedged them apart, forcing the woman to release her death grip on his arm. It is an effort not to lean down and fluff her ears while he asks her _whosagoodgirl_?

It’s only because he’s looking down at her affectionately that he sees what’s coming next before it happens. He watches as Matins, on what’s-her-name’s other side (Elsa? Elise?), lifts a leg, very clearly _aiming_ _himself_ at the woman’s shoes.

He should probably grab her and pull her out of the way. Unfortunately he finds himself fully occupied with the duties of being a King: he’s entirely too busy schooling himself not to laugh. _There will be no laughing. I will not laugh. I will not laugh_ now _at least. Maker, Eamon will flay me. Do. Not. Laugh._

By the sweet and blesséd mercy of Andraste, he succeeds. When she shrieks, he even manages a look of faint surprise.

It’s easy enough to stifle his laughter when Eamon appears, unleashing a stream of scolding on Arlessa that Alistair knows perfectly well is directed at himself, but under the neutral expression is a smirk. It's bitter and vindictive, but it is entirely his own. No matter how Eamon works at it, he cannot make Alistair marry. They can push him onto his stupid throne, and they can force the stupid crown on his stupider head, but they can't have this from him. Forget about _her._ Forget about _settling_. He takes a sudden viscous joy in the knowledge that the Theirin line will die with him in the Deep Roads, and there's nothing anyone can do about it. Let them choose their next monarch based on merit, not meaningless blood, and let their future be better than he can give them for it.

The bitterness does not fade until Arl Wulff approaches him later, a merry sparkle in his eyes. He cannot help returning it. When the man claps a big hand against his back, nearly sending Alistair stumbling, he can’t help feeling a bit like a child beside the hulking figure the arl cuts, though as an actual child, his mischief was never _encouraged_ the way the man proceeds to.

“Eh, mabaris will do as they will. If any Fereldans are too delicate of demeanor to endure it, perhaps they should consider moving to Orlais.”

It isn’t the first time it flashes through his mind that it’s a pity that King Maric’s brother-in-law wasn’t the Arl of West Hills rather than Redcliffe. The thought is, as usual, accompanied by a rush of guilt. Alistair has been fond of Arl Wulff since they had to talk him out of his defeated devastation into supporting the Wardens at the Landsmeet (if only he’d known then what that support would cost him), and all the more fond since the man has revealed himself, outside of war, as a cheerful optimist quick to backup the King he still remembers as one of the Wardens who put a stop to the pestilence crawling over his lands, but it’s an unfair thought to Eamon, who has given up everything of his own (except for the wife who, for all her attempts at ingratiation, still seems slightly disgusted to find the stable boy running her husband’s country) to devote himself to the surely exhausting exercise in futility of attempting to wrestle Alistair into a passable King.

Gallagher Wulff is an easy man to talk to. It isn’t until sounds of mixed outrage and amusement meet his ears that he realizes just how long it’s been since he saw the creatures he is morbidly certain are the cause of the commotion. Perhaps he should have kept a better eye, but he had not expected even them to dare testing Eamon _twice_ in one night.

Alistair wonders how inappropriate it would be to have a servant fetch him a glass of brandy before making his way over to deal with this latest development. _Two_ acts of insurgency may be enough to try even _his_ patience.

His first thought when he squeezes through the gathering crowd is that, well, no one will remember the peeing incident, that’s for sure. The pretty blond herself will probably not remember this as the ball at which her shoes were peed upon. Because Arlessa has truly outdone herself. Maker even knows where she has acquired it, and he can only assume that she must have enlisted the help of Grigor and Matins to get the thing on, but she is _wearing a dress_ . A rather ridiculous one, in fiercely bright shades of pink with dozens of gauzy layers. And she is _wearing it_.

Perhaps the most terrible part is that he cannot even muster himself up to be indignant. And he certainly can’t help himself from laughing. Given that he is hardly the only one, surely Eamon can’t hold this very much against him.

That’s when there’s a scream of outrage. “That monster is _wearing my dress_!”

Habren Bryland is standing in the entrance to the ballroom that leads off into the private quarters, apparently dressed only in a blanket, as she shrieks.

His first thought is to wonder how in the world a _dog_ managed to forcibly remove a gown from a full grown woman, but then he looks closer at the blanket she’s wrapped in. It is _his_ blanket. From his bed. In his private chambers. And suddenly he finds himself laughing all the harder. Because really, considering all the ways Arlessa could have reacted to finding a naked woman in his rooms, as he is fairly certain was her state when found, Eamon should be grateful she settled for mere humiliation as an appropriate revenge.

While Eamon yells at the servers and guards to _catch that dog_ , and Arlessa dodges and runs, intentionally froclicking and prancing as she does, Alistair steps closer to Habren, voice low. “I’m sure that approach has worked well for you before, but you should know you’re lucky she didn’t tear your throat out. You should also know that, while finding you dead in my chambers would have done nothing to please me, finding you alive and naked would have done little more.”

Her expression is one of haughty surprise with an underpinning of rage that is rapidly increasing to become the dominant expression.

His answers with merely a charming smile, “I can’t say I understand what it’s like to learn for the first time that you don’t always get your way. I don’t particularly remember learning that lesson the _first_ time. So I can’t really offer you a proper apology. But I can thank you for the reminder that _sometimes_ I _do_. Thank you, my lady.”

* * *

 The balls stop after what Eamon refers to as The Night of Ignominy. Had Alistair known, perhaps he would have offered a rather more sincere bit of gratitude to Habren. After all the years of his protests, had he only known three troublesome, wonderful mabari would relieve him of such displeasure, he’d have sought out canine companions before now.

And Eamon’s indignation does not affect him as it usually does. When the man declines their evening game of chess, he spends the time playing fetch, trying to learn to throw sticks in three different directions all at once to keep a jealous tantrum from occurring between Arlessa, Grigor, and Matins.

During the day he goes out. He hates the way people stare, but he hates feeling like a prisoner in the Palace more. So he walks through the Denerim market, thinking about the letter he sent to Phoebe, with a detailed description of Matins’ and most particularly Arlessa’s antics, and thinking of the letter and drawings she sent back.

_Dear Alistair,_

_I have interrogated Lord Eddelbrek thoroughly as to the appearances of Arlessa, Grigor, and Matins. I hope I have done them justice._

_Yours truly,_

_Phoebe Amell_

_Sister of the Hero of Ferelden, Warden Commander Solona Amell, Savior of Ferelden (and Thedas)_

_Honorary Grey Warden of Vigil’s Keep_

For a girl who’d never seen them at all, who hadn’t been there for the brilliance, she’d captured it perfectly. Himself, laughing. Arlessa, prancing. Grigor, tumbling into a pursuer behind her. Matins, lying in the middle of the floor, tripping another pursuer with a look of utter canine amusement.

Her name day is coming up. Phoebe’s. He doesn’t dare send anything more to Solona, is sure now that she would just send it back, but Phoebe. Phoebe should certainly have a present. Paint, he thinks. Perhaps she’d like paint.

He can’t say what it is that makes him look up. Light glancing off something. Some small movement from the corner of his eye. But when his gaze lands on the elven child crouching in the alley across from the market, staring at something with a desperate, covetous longing, he knows the look well. It resonates in him. It is an expression that graced his own childhood face far too often.

It’s Arlessa that helps him. He understands where she’s leading him before they get there, thinks he probably should have guessed on his own, but of all the many reasons he wore that expression as a child, he is at least fortunate that hunger was seldom the one.

It’s a table piled with apples. _That’s_ what the child is staring at. That is where Arlessa is leading him, with a whine as she cocks her head toward the child when they arrive. “Of course,” he mumbles to the mabari. Of course he’ll buy an apple for a hungry child.

The expression on the boy’s face when Alistair hands him the apple is entirely too much. It sends a pang of disgust with himself rolling through him. Because not three weeks ago he let Eamon force through a motion to raise taxes in the alienage. The chancellor claimed they had recovered from the winter famine well, and it was necessary, and Alistair had not known what to say, because he is, after all, only the bastard playing at King. What does he know about politics?

What he does know is this: it was wrong. What Eamon did was wrong, and he knew it, and he let it happen.

As his fingers move from the head of one dog to the next, he makes a promise. Maybe to the child. Maybe to the dogs. Most certainly to himself. _We’ll do better. From now on, we’ll do better than that. We can make things… maybe not right. But better. We can make things_ better.


End file.
